Porij today share new UK Garage inspired single ‘Unpredictable‘,taken from their debut album Teething, set for release April 26th on Play It Again Sam Records (Nation Of Language, Editors and Lykke Li). The song was premiered last night as Clara Amfo‘s Hottest Record on BBC Radio1 and the band will also play the legendary Madia ValeStudios on March 13th, in session with Clara. They head out to SXSW later this month, before going to L.A, to perform in session with KCRW. The 4-piece, who have carved a niche at the forefront of Queer-led dance-pop, will perform their biggest London headline show to date, at Electric Ballroom on April 24th. The new album is co-produced by the band and the legendary David Wrench (Frank Ocean, The xx, Young Fathers). With warm-up slots for Metronomy, Coldplay and Friendly Fires alongside their own crowd-igniting shows – Porij have been met with a landslide of attention at press and radio, lauded as “ones to watch” by tastemakers including The Guardian, NME and BBC 6 Music. The arrival of Teething invites you to take a leap beyond seeing dance music as a genre, built from this type of kick or that type of snare, and instead as its own dimension: a place you can escape to.
The roots of new single ‘Unpredictable’, lie with a poem Egg wrote about missing the simplicity of their early life but craving the complexity of the future which stretches out before them. It’s between those contradictions, the truths that co-exist rather than cancel each other out, that Porij have found a home.
On the new single,Porij say: “These lyrics came from a poem I wrote in November. It was fairly bleak, but in essence was all about missing the simplicity of my early life but craving the complexity of the life that could come. In that period of time everything felt quite up and down and I didn’t really know how I was going to feel from one day to the next.”
Speaking on the single’s gorgeous, hypnotic accompanying video, director Maxi McLachlan comments: “It’s weird to say my main point of reference was video game character building menus, but that’s where it started! The point was to try and create a video where Egg is constantly rotating but their clothes transform until it becomes so extreme that they warp into other band members. When we first discussed the video we knew we wanted it to reflect the chaotic but very carefully produced track. I wanted to create the feeling that Porij becomes so unpredictable that not even the machines can handle it and the whole thing shatters.”
Porij have endured the sharp pains of self-discovery. Every raw nerve, every bloody scrape and sprain, have been necessary for that unavoidable thing we must grit our teeth and bare: growing up. Vocalist and keyboardist Scout Moore (Egg), bassist James Middleton, guitarist Jacob Maguire and drummer Nathan Carroll are armed with hard-won experience, strengthened bonds and a renewed sense of passion. Their debut album Teething is both a coming-of-age story and a bottling of the particular magic that is unmistakably – and definitively – Porij.
Rather than floating just beyond our reach on a digital cloud, Porij are a real band anchored to tangible sound. Following their success over the last 3 years , the band had awoken an appetite for something we didn’t realise we were so hungry for: a collision of between the worlds of indie-rock and dance music, weaving together the organic with the electronic to create something at once tender and transcendent.
Teething proves that change can cut deep, but the propulsion to keep moving is what saves you.
1 – Marmite
2 – Unpredictable
3 – Don’t Talk To Me
4 – Endlessly Waiting
5 – My Only Love
6 – Ghost
7 – Stranger
8 – Sweet Risk
9 – Gutter Punch
10 – You Should Know Me
11 – Slow Down
Tour Dates
March 7th – Band On The Wall, Manchester, UK (6Music Festival)
March 11th – Baby’s All Right, New York, US
March 12th – SXSW Official Opening Party, Austin, US
March 13th – BBC British Music Embassy Showcase, Austin, US
March 14th – Planetary Radio Stage & Flood Magazine Stage, Austin, US
March 15th – Future Of Music Stage, Austin, US
March 16th – Selector Radio with Sian Eleri Stage, Austin, US
March 19th – School Night, LA, US
21st -23rd TreeFort Festival Boise, US
April 16th – The Gove, Newcastle, UK
April 17th – King Tut’s, Glasgow, UK
April 18th – acd3, Manchester, UK
April 19th – The Wardrobe, Leeds, UK
April 23rd – Trinity Centre, Bristol, UK
April 24th – Electric Ballroom, London, UK
April 30th – Rough Trade East, London, UK
Photo credit – Jesse Glazzard